Monday, October 28, 2013

One of the things that makes natural tea so fascinating is its smell. Each tea has its own. And there is no generic tea smell. And if you want to describe the smell of a particular tea, you'll end up using the scents of flowers, fruits, forests, meat, wood...! The scent of tea is particularly hard to grasp, because the essence of tea is to absorb the scents of its surroundings (soil, climate, neighboring plants...), its production process and its storage. There's so much we can tell from the smell of tea!

And the impact of a scent on our brain is unlike any other sense: there's no secondary center in the brain to analyze the sense of smell. The scents engrave directly in our memory. That's why we access directly into our memory when we smell a particular fragrance. This experience can help us recall certain moments of our childhood, when, for the first time, we have encountered a smell for the first time.

It's very sweet with ripe fruits. It reminded me of a warm ice cream! I kept on having a memory of ice cream with this tea! This didn't make much sense. Nothing felt cold in this tea. On the contrary!

Last Friday, after this very relaxed, calm brewing, I found the answer!

This shiny and tasty little cups of tea had a fragrance of black currant!

I guess, the very first time I had this fruit was in the form of an ice cream, or maybe even as a warm sauce on top of the ice cream?! I feel a relief in identifying this fragrance, at last. I'm also transported back in time to my first spoon of black currant!

With this memory, my mind makes further connections: a happy meal, a special occasion, Christmas! (la buche glacée, the desert of Christmas meal).

My tea happiness is multisensory:

- the colors are powerful, shiny and warm,

- the baroque music is peaceful,

- the scent of black currant evoques pleasant memories,

- the sweet and refined taste of the tea lingers on my palate.

This moment doesn't seem to end. Each cup and each brew renews the pleasure of combining all these feelings into one wonderful experience. The pictures tell this story better than my words. Now, as I'm writing, I go into an analytical mode examining what happened to me with each sense. But during the chaxi, the moment of enjoying the interaction between tea and teaware, the interaction of the senses, everything melts into a unique moment of happiness.

The tall 'flower' shaped 'ivory' porcelain cup helps to retain the heat better than a wide cup. With the cooler temperatures, I find it a good idea to switch to this kind of cup.

Once emptly, these cups concentrate the scents of the tea like a wenxiang bei (tall and thin smelling cups). This scent is the most evanescent and another cause for amazement. How can an empty cup still smell so good and for such a long time!

The secret of this amazingly graceful red tea is the quality of its material: mostly wild (old trees) puerh buds that have been processed into Dian Hung!

Wednesday, October 23, 2013

With these pictures of various tea sets, we can time travel and remind ourselves how tea used to be prepared. Let's characterize the methods of each period and see if we can find inspiration in this rich past.

Sung and Ming styles

Sung dynasty tea used to be steamed green tea, turned into powder and then whisked in a black bowl. For Kakuzo Okakura (The book of tea), this represents the romantic period of tea. Tea drinkers saw tea as a reflection of their spiritual journey. Why? Because tea is so sensitive to how it is whisked. Your state of mind is reflected in the tea you prepare. Zen meditation helps to control yourself and was intricately linked to the tea preparation. Zen is the spirit of Sung tea.

After the Yuan dynasty, it's a peasant who became Emperor Hongwu of the Ming dynasty. Starting 1391, he only accepts gifts of loose leaves tea (instead of compressed). Green tea was then brewed in big teapots. This marks a return to nature, to simplicity. Loose green tea is the least processed tea. It's therefore also the cheapest to produce and the most affordable for the population. The big teapot helps dilute the light, but concentrated flavors of spring tea buds. Drinking green tea is all about the natural purity and freshness of its taste that connects us to nature. Nature is the spirit of Ming tea.

Oolong is invented during the Qing dynasty and the Chaoshan region prepares this complex, semi-oxidized and roasted tea in a small Yixing, preferably zhuni, teapot, (or a shantou teapot) with water boiled in a small Nilu and 3 small porcelain ruoshen cups. The small size of the teaware demonstrates a search for quality and refinement. The spirit of Gongfu cha is minimalism and elegance rooted in the Chinese culture.

Qing and modern styles

The contribution of the modern (western) era is to bring rational rules and standards to tea brewing. Tea preparation becomes a science. The most standardized brewing is the competition brewing. You often read me preparing my teas this way: boiling water (98 degrees Celcius), 3 grams, 150 ml porcelain vessel, for 6 minutes. The spirit of this tea is reason.

Each method, each era has its pros and cons. We are privileged to live at the beginning of a new era, the information age, and we can learn the best from each period. This will help us create or adapt our own new brewing style.

For example, the rational approach of having a very standardized brewing process works very well to select and/or compare teas. This is true when we treat tea as a beverage, a simple commodity. It's like having a set of standard questions for meeting somebody (name, age, origin, where did you go to school, what's your occupation...) It is helpful in the beginning of the relationship. But once you get to know this person, you will start to treat it more and more individually. You'll go to a certain type of restaurants together or do certain activities or discuss certain topics with this particular person. Likewise, once you know a tea well, you'll tire of always brewing it the same way. You'll want to experiment and try what type of ware are the best fit, how long it prefers to brew. That's how you'll find the best way to brew these leaves.

So, the competition brewing standard helps you quickly to get to know the basic character and qualities of your tea. (I also recommend that you use standard and rational methods to compare tea cups, teapots, various water, kettles...)

It's a good start to learn about tea, but there is no skill in following a 'recipe' like a robot (7 grams, 30 seconds....) Even in recipes, you're supposed to judge on your own when a dish is ready. The cookbook may say 30 minutes at 200 degrees, but you might shorten or lengthen the time if your eyes tell you the crust isn't as it should be, or if the smell isn't well done yet.

So, at some point, you'll have to start using your senses to brew. This is the second step on the path to a great cup of tea.

You'll go even further if you find your inspiration in the quest for quality and refinement from the Chaoshan gongfu cha. You can also pursue very natural and pure flavors, like during Ming dynasty. Tea may even lead you to a more peaceful self if you use these moments of calm to connect body and mind... China's past shows us that tea is so much more than just a beverage!

Thursday, October 17, 2013

This new addition to my selection is the famous '7542' raw puerh cake. Many regard this cake as the follow-up to the "Luyin" (green mark) puerh from the 60s. Having seen both next to each other, I must agree that both cakes look very similar when you look at their mix of dry leaves.

7542 is the name of the recipe.'75' stands for the year when it was started: 1975.'4' stands for a certain mix of leaves. In the case of this cake, 4 means a mix that contains smaller leaves and more buds that the '8582' cake, for instance.'2' stands for the Menghai Tea Factory.

The buds are the easiest leaves to spot on a raw puerh cake: they keep the lighter yellow/gold color.

There are many pitfalls in finding a good '7542':- Fakes: the more famous a puerh is, the more forgeries there are! - Age: This is a recipe that has been produced year after year until now. How do you know its age when the wrapper stays the same?- Quality of the leaves: Is this 7542 recipe stable in quality over the years?- Storage: How clean was it? Did it go through a wodui (fake aging) period?- Price : A high price is not a guarantee that it's real or good. Too good a bargain, though, is a sign of problems.

There is nothing written on this cake that tells us its age. My source says it's from spring 1999. To confirm this information, the best is to compare it to other puerhs that have the same age (more or less). From a visual point of view, it's the color of the puerh buds that will give the most clues about the age of the puerh. Because they turn brown very slowly. Second, the brew itself will also tell us how old it feels. That's where reliable samples are essential to provide good benchmarks to evaluate a puerh.

Visually, we can also tell that these leaves haven't been through a wodui process, otherwise their color would be much more evenly dark brown. We can also see that the wrapper is quite clean. There are no stains from water or tea the paper. The smell, on the other hand, points toward a typical old puerh storage scent: old wood, old basement smell.

For this very first brewing, I have easily flaked 3 grams from the cake without breaking any leaf.

To get an accurate brew, I have opted for a simple porcelain gaiwan. My goal isn't to make the best brew today, but to get to know these leaves and confirm that they are legit (or not).

I want to push these leaves to their limits and test their quality. Quality will help determine if this is a real '7542' or a fake.

Nevertheless, I can't resist using my Nilu on this cooler day. The red charcoals slowly heat my silver kettle. The silver will provide a very sharp and very hot water for these brews. The charcoals add a sweet scent and a very cosy, 'take it slow' atmosphere.

Indeed, there is no rush with my brews. Each lasts several minutes. No rinsing of the leaves, either, since the cake is clean.

In 1999, the CNNP company (China National Native Produce) is still a state company and hasn't been privatized, yet. It was still operating like it had for decades. The privation happened in the early 2000s and this major change probably explains why consequently the quality of this recipe diminished greatly afterwards: the new owners of the brand wanted a quick return on their investment...

The reputation of recent 7542 disappeared like steam in the air!

The first brew we obtain is dark red turning slightly brown. This color confirms that there is no cooked puerh mixed here (or the brew would be much darker).

The camphor and old wood scents are very powerful and persisting. The tea coats the whole mouth quite comfortably. There's still some sharpness and astringency due to its still young age. But despite this concentration, the brew tastes very smooth and clean overall. Its aftertaste is amazingly powerful. There are so many nice things happening in the mouth: salivation, releasing of sweetness in the throat... The stomach feels warm: good chaqi.

Another important characteristic: the mouth and the tongue continue to feel 'clean' and light.

The follow-up brews develop even more this clean and pure taste combined with these nice old raw puerh smells and the powerful aftertaste. This is a cake with lots of energy and a good balance.

The quality of the brews and the endurance of the leaves convinces me that this is indeed a puerh of high quality. A real '7542' from the year 1999 that has been well stored in Taiwan.

The open leaves all unfurl well and don't show any sign of having been artificially fermented. There's a generous amount of buds among these leaves. But there are also some thick stems. These are also quite nice to have, as I have experienced on the '8582'

Acquiring a cake or a sample of this puerh makes a lot of sense at the current market prices. Very old puerhs have so much increased in value these recent years that they have become very expensive. 'High quality' young puerhs are selling at relatively high prices and it isn't easy to tell their quality or how well they will age. This classic, iconic '7542', on the other hand, is already 14 years old (that's also 14 years less to wait) and comes at a very reasonable and attractive price for its launch. (It's 1 dollar per gram or less. Valid through 2013 only.)

Enjoy this classic puerh with age, character, power and harmony!

Update: For GN, here is a better picture of the neifei. (It's very difficult to remove without breaking it!)